Pensamiento judío sobre Números 20:5

(5) Their understanding of "I shall deal severely with Pharaoh," had been quite different from the way G-d had meant it. G-d had been waiting for Israel to appeal to HIM, as Shemot Rabbah 21, explains the words "let Me hear your voice." (Song of Songs 2,14) Israel had to be reminded continuously that they were in need of G-d’s personal intervention. One of Israel's constant worries was that maybe G-d had meant for them to be free in Rameses, and that Moses had taken it upon himself to lead them out of Egypt, and that their various difficulties were all due to Moses having exercised his own volition. The Israelites' fear of dying without burial in the desert overcame them. If they would die in Egypt, they would be buried at least, if only to remove the stench of their rotting bodies. Moses now denied them even such elementary human dignity, they claimed. Slavery in Egypt would have been a price worth paying, if it meant avoiding death without burial in the desert. Moses replied that G-d’s rescue would be total. Once you will witness it, Moses said, tacharishu you will keep silent, will criticise no longer.

I believe that the four species are a symbolical expression of our rejoicing that the Israelites changed the wilderness, “no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates, or of water to drink” (Num. 20:5), with a country full of fruit-trees and rivers. In order to remember this we take the fruit which is the most pleasant of the fruit of the land, branches which smell best, most beautiful leaves, and also the best of herbs, i.e., the willows of the brook. These four kinds have also those three purposes: First, they were plentiful in those days in Palestine, so that every one could easily get them. Secondly, they have a good appearance, they are green; some of them, viz., the citron and the myrtle, are also excellent as regards their smell, the branches of the palm-tree and the willow having neither good nor bad smell. Thirdly, they keep fresh and green for seven days, which is not the case with peaches, pomegranates, asparagus, nuts, and the like.

Of this kind is the enumeration of the stations [of the Israelites in the wilderness] (Num. xxxiii.). At first sight it appears to be entirely useless; but in order to obviate such a notion Scripture says, “And Moses wrote their goings out according to their journeys by the commandment of the Lord” (ibid. ver. 2). It was indeed most necessary that these should be written. For miracles are only convincing to those who witnessed them; whilst coming generations, who know them only from the account given by others, may consider them as untrue. But miracles cannot continue and last for all generations; it is even inconceivable [that they should be permanent]. Now the greatest of the miracles described in the Law is the stay of the Israelites in the wilderness for forty years, with a daily supply of manna. This wilderness, as described in Scripture, consisted of places “wherein were fiery serpents and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water” (Deut. 8:115); places very remote from cultivated land, and naturally not adapted for the habitation of man, “It is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates, neither is there any water to drink” (Num. 20:5); “A land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt” (Jer. 2:6). [In reference to the stay of the Israelites in the wilderness], Scripture relates, “Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink” (Deut. 19:5). All these miracles were wonderful, public, and witnessed by the people. But God knew that in future people might doubt the correctness of the account of these miracles. in the same manner as they doubt the accuracy of other narratives; they might think that the Israelites stayed in the wilderness in a place not far from inhabited land, where it was possible for man to live [in the ordinary way]; that it was like those deserts in which Arabs live at present; or that they dwelt in such places in which they could plow, sow, and reap, or live on some vegetable that was growing there; or that manna came always down in those places as an ordinary natural product; or that there were wells of water in those places. In order to remove all these doubts and to firmly establish the accuracy of the account of these miracles, Scripture enumerates all the stations, so that coming generations may see them, and learn the greatness of the miracle which enabled human beings to live in those places forty years.